All things in moderation, including moderation (Mark Twain)

This week has been quite busy at school with all of our students doing tests in English, mathematics, Islamic studies, Arabic studies, science, geography, history and social studies.

The first trimester ends this Thursday and we have a three week break over Christmas before Trimester Two starts on January 8.

My dream team of advisors assist in English, mathematics, science, and Arabic so we have all been heavily involved with moderation of marking (Gavin is the ICT advisor but there are no ICT tests for him to moderate).

I’ve posted on this before but it’s worth repeating – Nu Zild educators could learn heaps from the rigorous moderation procedures we use here BEFORE the teachers mark their tests. They then have a benchmark to mark against. It so much harder to moderate after the fact.

And less is more, as this extract indicates (and Mark Twain's quote summarises):

Moderation is considered a key part of a person's personal development in Taoist philosophy and religion. There is nothing that cannot be moderated including ones actions, ones desires and even thoughts. It is believed that by doing so one achieves a more natural state, faces less resistance in life and recognises one's limits.Taken to the extreme, moderation is complex and can be difficult to not only accept, but also understand and implement. It can also be recursive in that one should moderate how much they moderate (i.e. to not be too worried about moderating everything or not to try too hard in finding a middle ground).

Anyway - here is a selection of photos showing the moderating process at work in mathematics with Jan, English with Peter and Arabic studies with me, without being too try hard!


Maths - Ahmed (HOD), Samir, Samer, Jan juggles the glasses. 



English - Peter, Nidal (HOD), Hichem, Jalal.



Arabic studies - Abdulla, Salem, me, Abdelazim (HOD), Shaban.